Slum Village has little to say lyrically.

Inconsistency or complexity? Depends on how much you believe in this music as sincere self-expression versus its status as smartly crafted, artist-as-listener-proxy pop.

Listeners who prefer their folk flashier or wrapped around memorable, poppy hooks might find Pratt's approach meandering or bland. But those with a more patient ear will find her a worthy and quietly distinct heir of Baier, Bunyan, and Dalton's homespun sound.

Based on Andy and His Grandmother, Kaufman comes off like an asshole, a hopelessly naive loser, a crazy person, a hothead, a hopelessly sweet grandma's boy, a sexually confused teenager, and a manipulative monster. In other words, he comes off like Andy Kaufman.

The Shabazz Palaces cut is easily the most interesting song here, and seems to be the one you might still be pulling out once in a while in another six months. Considering that the EP, with three versions of the same song in a row, isn’t really meant to be heard as a whole, getting one truly intriguing track out of it isn’t such a bad deal.

Concert albums never sound like the concerts they're supposed to capture, and with a band whose presence can stifle trite conversation like High on Fire's, it's a disservice.

You get the sense of an artist whose songwriting potential hasn’t been maximized, as Callinan’s got the vocal chops to keep Embracism interesting throughout.

This is ultimately a transitory record, its gate-crashing momentum tempered by songs that feel like holdovers from Gauntlet Hair’s more whimsical debut. With Stills’ crisper production cleaning up the band’s formative psych-pop splatter, the album’s more sanguine tracks.

Blumberg is a capable, if not particularly distinguished guitarist. He is also a songwriter with an unusual gift for sticky, familiar hooks and the issue here is that Unreal puts far more emphasis on the former.

There are plenty of bands that mapped inspired paths to greatness, but Big Star's story, as seen on film and heard on these songs, is a potent reminder of just how beautiful failure can be.

While Cedermark is an ace guitarist and affecting lyricist, his songwriting isn’t quite as rigorous or sharp.

There's a sweetly consistent mood throughout; it’s something you can put on and treat as ambient sound, but there’s also a clever subtlety in their process.

The main weakness is the same one found on Crazy Clown Time: the songs. As songs, they don’t do much or say much.

Joey too often comes out looking like someone who’s already grown weary of the system, an 18-year-old curmudgeon, a sharp contrast with the energy that 1999 promised.

Time Off’s biggest asset is its ease. There’s a real sense, listening to these tracks, that everything could be a little simpler if we all stopped trying so hard.

Every song on this album could stand to be tightened. Most could lose a verse or two, and a lot of them would sound much better if they were played faster.

With its quaking rhythms, twisted riffage, and jet-black wit, Major Arcana is a redemptive ode to the broken bones that grew back together a little crooked--the ones that taught Dupuis how to walk in her own weird way.

Southeastern is easily Isbell’s best solo album--his most richly conceived and generously written. If it’s not quite the album that lives up to his considerable talents, it’s mostly the music that’s to blame.

Ciara feels slightly (though only slightly) weaker when she swims against the current of her own charm and tries for “raw.”

Though repetitive, the record is consistently engaging, with plenty of distinct highlights.

Style trumps niche every time here, and in its efficiently compact sub-hour runtime there's plenty of opportunity to let that style run through all kind of territory.

While All Hell felt imbued with danger and intrigue, on Me Moan, the people pulled off to highway shoulder are never in any real distress upon closer inspection. They just stepped out to check a map.

It would sound overproduced for 1998 yet seems curiously rinky-dink compared to the current pop maximalism of any continent; Scott & Rivers splits most of its time between ruthlessly utilitarian power pop and midtempo, jangly acoustic alt-rock that reimagines the break between Pinkerton and the Green Album as one where Cuomo ditched Harvard for higher education in the form of Stroke 9 or Eve 6 CDs.

Without Your Love ends up becoming a loose survey of Dexter's work instead the Nihjgt Feelings statement he intended it to be.

Rather than dour, however, the album sounds concerned, perhaps even worried, which illuminates even some of its weaker or seemingly extraneous tracks. It focuses Pollard, who sounds like a man who has said so much already but still has so much left to say.

On The Dusted Sessions they both deconstruct and reinforce the tenets of Americana and make something transcendent in the process.

The weirdly distant and safe Magna Carta Holy Grail abides by the tried and true business principle that the customer is always right: you just have to remember who the customer is here.

Occasionally plodding, and too ruminative by half, Anarchic Breezes is a journey in need of a destination, stuck between staring at the sun and gazing thoughtfully at its own navel.